


Love Never Blows Up and Gets Killed

by feverbeats



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-10
Updated: 2010-06-10
Packaged: 2017-10-10 01:19:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/93644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feverbeats/pseuds/feverbeats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Well," Barty says, and he thinks he must be stoned, because his speech slows and slurs a little, "I guess we met at one of Quirrell's get-togethers."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Never Blows Up and Gets Killed

**Author's Note:**

> Title from _Venture Bros_. Apparently I just don't get sick of writing about these dudes getting stoned. Oh yeah, and I know this doesn't fit JKR's stated timeline for Bill, but idgaf. Hooray, responsibility to canon, I don't have it!

  
The year after Regulus graduates from Hogwarts, Barty and Quirrell are still sixteen, so they have to sneak out of school when they want to hang out with him. By this time, Barty is wearing a leather jacket whenever he can get away with ditching the Hogwarts uniform, although Quirrell still wears his tie in a somewhat absent-minded manner no matter where they go.

Tonight, they're a show in the bad part of London, a place they wouldn't be able to get to without Regulus apparating with them. The band that's playing is truly terrible, but Barty thinks they might be Quirrell's friends, so he doesn't say anything.

Bill, a year younger than Barty and the only Gryffindor in the group, waves them over and shouts over the noise that's masquerading as music, "I see you managed to get out all right!"

Barty nods. Bill was already in London, having escaped from school by unknown means to sell the cheap jewelery he makes to kids in the London streets. Barty slings and arm around him, delighting in how angry Bill's parents would be if they could see this.

Bill leans over to plant a messy kiss on Barty's cheek. "Love the jacket. That new?"

"Yeah," Barty says, pleased. "Hey, listen, think you can manage to get away for Christmas? I won't be going home, and I thought we could get a room someplace."

Bill laughs his rough, young laugh and gestures with whatever he's smoking. "You kidding? My mum nearly killed me when you talked me into getting that tattoo. You'll be lucky if she lets me out of her sight when I'm home."

Quirrell laughs. "Hey, the tattoo didn't look half bad."

"Be better if you hadn't gotten it at Dark Mark's," Regulus says, falling into the easy, colloquial speech patterns Barty's noticed he sometimes adopts around his friends.

"Mark's is very sanitary," Quirrell says defensively.

*

After the show, they all go to Regulus's boyfriend's house to smoke. Quirrell claims to have a dealer in the area, and he passes a few blunts around happily. Barty has a lower tolerance for the stuff than the rest of them, so he smokes slowly, just taking few puffs now now and then when Regulus lets his hand weave too close to Barty, joint wavering slightly.

"Tell me again how you two got together," Regulus demands, sprawled comfortably on the bed. His boyfriend isn't home yet, so they're unlikely to get shouted at by anyone about smoking in here.

Bill, curled around Barty, mutters something incoherent.

"Well," Barty says, and he thinks he must be stoned, because his speech slows and slurs a little, "I guess we met at one of Quirrell's get-togethers. You weren't there. I think you were doing things for your—for your club."

"Yeah," Quirrell says, "And I said, 'Who invited the Gryffindor?' and nobody could remember, and then you snogged him all night."

"So really you've no idea how it happened because you were stoned out of your minds," Regulus sighs.

Barty nods. "Yeah, guess we were. But listen, I did something really mad after that. I wanted to ask him out properly, you know, like I'd been taught, but I didn't want him to turn me down because I sounded like a ponce, so . . ." He waves his blunt in the air. "So I asked mad old Moody for advice."

"You're bloody kidding," Bill says, half sitting up. "You didn't tell me that."

Regulus's eyes are wide. "You _talked_ to him? What did he _say?_"

Barty shrugs, suddenly uncomfortable. He feels a bit weird mentioning the fact that he's sort of chummy with people from the Ministry. It's only because of his dad, but it still makes him feel out of place. The story itself, though, is too good not to tell. "Right, so listen," he says, pleased to have all of their attention. "He took me aside and he said, 'You get the person alone, right? And then you lean right in and you say to 'em, "You and me. Now."' It was fucking mad, I mean it. Kept going on about how you've got to be forceful, and if that—if that doesn't work—" He dissolves into helpless laughter.

"Go on," Regulus insists, grabbing another joint from Quirrell. He doesn't get high easily.

Barty forces his face into an approximation of Moody's expression. "If it doesn't work, you just grab them by the jaw and kiss them. And if they turn you down, you're supposed to say 'Your loss' and swagger off like you don't give a fuck."

Bill leans back against Barty, grinning. "You're serious. He really said all that. S'pose _he's_ ever done that to anyone?"

They all go silent, contemplating the terrifying prospect. Finally, Quirrell says, "I reckon so, yeah."

"Doesn't bear thinking about, really," Regulus announces, very carefully putting out his joint on a coaster that sits on the bedside table. "Oh, fucking hell. Someone's spilled beer on the floor."

Bill sighs. "That might've been me. Sorry."

Regulus gives him a look that reminds Barty of his father and Bill's mother. "_Billius_. Barty, if you're going to drag your underage boyfriend everyone, can't you make sure he learns some manners?"

Barty wants to say that the point is that Bill has no manners and is exactly the sort of person his father would loathe unconditionally, but that sounds a bit too much like admitting that he's using Bill, and even stoned that sounds like a bad idea. "Sorry," he says.

"S'all right," Regulus says, loosening up again. "I'll just have to clean it up before anyone gets home, that's all."

"'Anyone' being code for 'my boyfriend who isn't any fun', right?" Quirrell asks. "You should ask him to get high with us."

There's a two-second pause while they all wonder who's going to start laughing first, but they all crack at about the same moment.

"Brilliant," Bill manages finally. "That'd go over brilliantly, right?"

"Thanks, but I like having somewhere to live," Regulus says, grinning.

Bill stops laughing long enough to kiss Barty, who warps his arms around him. Yes, these are the worst sort of friends, the sort his father never thought to warn him about, and he's delighted to have them.


End file.
